A Guy Can Dream
My little-blog-that-could turned 13 last month and this entry marks my 800th post. I'm not sure what I envisioned when I embarked on this all those many years ago but it's been an enjoyable investment of time and I hope to keep tapping out entries for many years to come.
I'll be honest—Tammy and I were saddened, ashamed, shocked and embarrassed by Trump's election to lead our country. Even when I was an ardent conservative a little more than 10 years ago I can't imagine I would've supported someone of his temperament and repugnant behavior and his total lack of preparedness for the job.
I'm actually not surprised by the election results when you consider the amount of over-the-top hatred directed at Hillary Clinton by a republican smear machine that had been relentlessly pursuing her for decades. The party of God sure knows how to hate. That's one of the takeaways for me from all of this. They had abundant forgiveness for Trump and his endless list of faults but not an ounce of that same forgiveness for Clinton. As an aside: in the wake of this election, evangelicals have forever relinquished their moral high-ground to ever again preach to the rest of us about anyone's moral character. Forever.
Congressional investigations of Clinton and the FBI inserting itself into the election with days remaining in the campaign all worked to help defeat her. And of course, there were the WikiLeaks releases along with Russia's hacking of emails of people from Clinton's inner circle that helped to tarnish her image. Republicans and the press, rather than dismissing the ill-gotten gains, made them all frontpage news instead. Sure, there was Trump's "pussy" tape but hey, we men talk like that and grab women by their pussies all the time so what's the big deal?
And the Affordable Care Act was a huge drag on Clinton's candidacy. With Republicans in congress not allowing any fixes to be made to it since it was signed into law, it was only a matter of time before it would begin to unnecessarily and negatively impact people economically. It was all by Republican design and it worked. People suffered but their guy was elected and that's all that mattered to God's Own Party.
It should concern us all that Russia may well have flipped this election in favor of Trump by their hacking efforts to bring Clinton down. And why? It's beyond my ability to make an educated guess but I can't help but suspect that Trump may have amassed some debt from Russia and perhaps Putin thinks he can trade leniency from a Trump administration (we have sanctions on Russia for their act of aggression toward Crimea) for some loan forgiveness for Trump. No, I don't think it's far-fetched to allow my mind to go there, and no, we'll never, ever see his tax statements he promised us. There has to be a reason for Russia's meddling in our election and their apparent preference for Trump that should be of concern to us all.
Our country remains hopelessly and sharply divided along party lines and it's an especially difficult time to be a Democrat with Republicans having won big on election day.
Republicans are talking in terms of having a mandate despite Trump receiving fewer overall votes than Clinton. I'm not sure how that equates to a mandate but with control of both houses of Congress and the Presidency, it's going to be difficult for Democrats to stop them.
In another era, we never would've seen a political party holding hostage a U.S Supreme Court vacancy but that's where we're at today. And yet, in the shadow of that, I'm seeing lots of posts on Facebook about the need for unity. Yeah, that would be nice but I have to ask—where was this talk of unity the past 8 years toward Obama by Republicans?
I have an image of Lucy with a football and Linus—fooled again.
No, I don't suspect I'll be traveling down Unity Road anytime soon. I and tens of millions of others will work our way through the 5 stages of grief over this election and be smarter and stronger for it in our resolve to right the wrongs as best we can once a Trump presidency has taken its toll. Our politics is always in a state of flux but this new administration and tea-party Republicans are bent on taking us back 50 years and beyond (socially) and seem to be set to cowboy-up and go kick some Middle Eastern ass as soon as they've got their power fully in place. I'm concerned.
I do have a fix for this divide we're experiencing but it's pie in the sky thinking that came to me on the golf course this afternoon. My wish: Trump goes against those in his party (he really owes them nothing) and gives a nod to Merrick Garland, President Obama's nominee for the U. S. Supreme Court who has been languishing in never-never land since March. Yeah, I know it will never happen but just imagine if it did that and what if the Senate actually approved him? People like me would suddenly be more than a little willing to consider a search for common ground because right now there's none and that's no way to run a country.
The Cubs win the World Series. Trump wins the presidency. Anything is possible!
A guy can dream.
I'll be honest—Tammy and I were saddened, ashamed, shocked and embarrassed by Trump's election to lead our country. Even when I was an ardent conservative a little more than 10 years ago I can't imagine I would've supported someone of his temperament and repugnant behavior and his total lack of preparedness for the job.
I'm actually not surprised by the election results when you consider the amount of over-the-top hatred directed at Hillary Clinton by a republican smear machine that had been relentlessly pursuing her for decades. The party of God sure knows how to hate. That's one of the takeaways for me from all of this. They had abundant forgiveness for Trump and his endless list of faults but not an ounce of that same forgiveness for Clinton. As an aside: in the wake of this election, evangelicals have forever relinquished their moral high-ground to ever again preach to the rest of us about anyone's moral character. Forever.
Congressional investigations of Clinton and the FBI inserting itself into the election with days remaining in the campaign all worked to help defeat her. And of course, there were the WikiLeaks releases along with Russia's hacking of emails of people from Clinton's inner circle that helped to tarnish her image. Republicans and the press, rather than dismissing the ill-gotten gains, made them all frontpage news instead. Sure, there was Trump's "pussy" tape but hey, we men talk like that and grab women by their pussies all the time so what's the big deal?
And the Affordable Care Act was a huge drag on Clinton's candidacy. With Republicans in congress not allowing any fixes to be made to it since it was signed into law, it was only a matter of time before it would begin to unnecessarily and negatively impact people economically. It was all by Republican design and it worked. People suffered but their guy was elected and that's all that mattered to God's Own Party.
It should concern us all that Russia may well have flipped this election in favor of Trump by their hacking efforts to bring Clinton down. And why? It's beyond my ability to make an educated guess but I can't help but suspect that Trump may have amassed some debt from Russia and perhaps Putin thinks he can trade leniency from a Trump administration (we have sanctions on Russia for their act of aggression toward Crimea) for some loan forgiveness for Trump. No, I don't think it's far-fetched to allow my mind to go there, and no, we'll never, ever see his tax statements he promised us. There has to be a reason for Russia's meddling in our election and their apparent preference for Trump that should be of concern to us all.
Our country remains hopelessly and sharply divided along party lines and it's an especially difficult time to be a Democrat with Republicans having won big on election day.
Republicans are talking in terms of having a mandate despite Trump receiving fewer overall votes than Clinton. I'm not sure how that equates to a mandate but with control of both houses of Congress and the Presidency, it's going to be difficult for Democrats to stop them.In another era, we never would've seen a political party holding hostage a U.S Supreme Court vacancy but that's where we're at today. And yet, in the shadow of that, I'm seeing lots of posts on Facebook about the need for unity. Yeah, that would be nice but I have to ask—where was this talk of unity the past 8 years toward Obama by Republicans?
I have an image of Lucy with a football and Linus—fooled again.
No, I don't suspect I'll be traveling down Unity Road anytime soon. I and tens of millions of others will work our way through the 5 stages of grief over this election and be smarter and stronger for it in our resolve to right the wrongs as best we can once a Trump presidency has taken its toll. Our politics is always in a state of flux but this new administration and tea-party Republicans are bent on taking us back 50 years and beyond (socially) and seem to be set to cowboy-up and go kick some Middle Eastern ass as soon as they've got their power fully in place. I'm concerned.
I do have a fix for this divide we're experiencing but it's pie in the sky thinking that came to me on the golf course this afternoon. My wish: Trump goes against those in his party (he really owes them nothing) and gives a nod to Merrick Garland, President Obama's nominee for the U. S. Supreme Court who has been languishing in never-never land since March. Yeah, I know it will never happen but just imagine if it did that and what if the Senate actually approved him? People like me would suddenly be more than a little willing to consider a search for common ground because right now there's none and that's no way to run a country.
The Cubs win the World Series. Trump wins the presidency. Anything is possible!
A guy can dream.
Comments
I didn't want to post my exact thoughts on facebook for all to read.
Essentially if you use your imagination you can come to believe that if Trump is as unhinged as people think he is, he won't outlive his first year in office.
Anyone with half a brain and a concern for the country and the rest of civilization as we know it would be willing to do what it takes to end him.
His running mate albeit a right wing classic phony Christian of the worst kind would be a manageable president.
However I hope this won't be necessary.
As I said in my post reply is that there are people behind the scenes that in my view will do what is necessary to limit his actions and reactions.
When I said it is a good thing that he is considering bringing in one or more of his family members as possible cabinet position holders I was thinking of JFK and Bobby as an example of brothers working together. Trump does have some predictable characteristics. One of which is to hire his competition. His smarter competition that is. I wouldn't be surprised to see him bring in Lindsey Graham as Defense Secretary to help quell the concerns about his lack of knowledge with respect to our military and defense concerns. Lindsey is a good guy and I trust his ability. I'll be interested to see where Trump's head is at in a month.
What's as concerning in the aftermath is the control that republicans now have and how little the democrats can do to stop them. We're going to see a republican ideology on steroids enter the scene and it's not going to be nice. Tax cuts for the wealthy at the expense of social programs, more and more monies needed for defense to expand our already obscenely large military. And watch what happens to the national debt which stands at just under $20 trillion. Buckle up!
Thanks for your comments.
I have enjoyed reading your posts for much of that time.
My own humble blog is just over 10 years old.